A bird strike (sometimes called birdstrike, bird ingestion (for an engine), bird hit, or bird aircraft strike hazard (BASH)) is a collision between a flying animal (usually a bird, occasionally bat) and a moving vehicle (typically an aircraft, occasionally high-speed train or automobile). The term is also used for bird deaths resulting from collisions with highrise buildings, towers (see bird–skyscraper collisions and towerkill) and tall structures such as overhead power lines and wind turbines.
A significant threat to aviation safety, bird strikes have caused a number of accidents with human casualties. There are over 13,000 bird strikes annually in the US alone. However, the number of major accidents involving civil aircraft is quite low and it has been estimated that there is only about one accident resulting in human death in one billion (10) flying hours. The majority of bird strikes (65%) cause little damage to the aircraft; however, the collision is usually fatal to the bird(s) involved.
